What's wrong with U. S. unions, and what could make it right? These are
the questions addressed by nineteen partisans—union dissidents and noted
scholars—of union democracy. Agreeing that any long-term solutions must
come from the grassroots of the union movement, they argue for expansion
rather than contraction, militancy rather than accommodation, and internal
democracy rather than oligarchy. To break the stranglehold of business,
union, and government elites, they emphasize, ordinary workers must be
energetically recruited and actively involved in the management of their
unions.

Ray Tillman is president of the National Association of Letter Carriers
Branch 642. Michael Cummings is chair of the Political Science Depart-
ment at the University of Colorado at Denver.

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